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Milosevic foe shot? Huh. Bring on the soccer

June 16, 2000
Web posted at: 5:36 PM EDT (2136 GMT)

By Tony Karon

(TIME.com) -- Somebody wanted Vuk Draskovic dead, but it may not have been Slobodan Milosevic -- after all, the Serbian strongman has little reason to fear the veteran opposition leader these days. In contrast to the string of professional hits that have eliminated both friend and foe of the Milosevic regime over the past year, Friday's attempt on Draskovic was an amateurish hit-or-miss affair, the gunmen spraying the opposition leader's holiday apartment with automatic rifle fire while he was vacationing in Montenegro. But not even an attempt on his life is likely to restore his declining political fortunes.

Draskovic may once have been the opposition leader most threatening to Milosevic, as he led hundreds of thousands of protesters through the streets of Belgrade in the winter of 1996. But Milosevic managed to draw him into a national unity government during the Kosovo war, and his continued feuding with rival oppositionists, and the government's seizure of the Belgrade TV station he controlled, appear to have pushed him to the margins. It isn't only Draskovic that's on the skids, however; it's the very idea of overthrowing Milosevic. "The center of gravity of opposition has not only moved away from Draskovic," says TIME Belgrade reporter Dejan Anastasijevic, "it has dissolved. Serbs have been demoralized by an opposition led by the same squabbling individuals for the past 10 years, who have failed to get rid of Milosevic despite an economic collapse and four wars that he started and lost." A growing number of Serbs have turned to a more diffuse, student-led protest movement, Otpor (meaning "resistance"). "Still, Otpor's plan was to put pressure on the traditional opposition leaders to create a single movement, but Draskovic's withdrawal makes that very unlikely," says Anastasijevic. "Besides, right now the European soccer championships are on, and everyone is at home or in cafes watching the games on television -- the revolution is postponed." And while student actions may resume after the final whistle blows, Slobodan Milosevic's grip on power looks even firmer today than it did a year ago, when he surrendered Kosovo.

Copyright © 2000 Time Inc.